Recent Questions - Law Meta Stack Exchangemost recent 30 from law.meta.stackexchange.com2019-02-22T15:34:08Zhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/feedshttp://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/rdfhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7730Can I withdraw my vote?Alex Doehttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/215692019-02-19T01:18:36Z2019-02-19T15:33:08Z
<p>I down voted an answer to someone else's question, but then I realized I shouldn't have done so. As it stands right now, I can only take back my "down" vote with an up vote.<br>
Is it just my device? Or is it the system that does not let me withdraw my down vote without leaving an up vote instead</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7705What to do with answers that offer legal advice?Nate Eldredgehttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/5762019-02-15T15:02:16Z2019-02-19T21:21:08Z
<p>We have a clear policy that <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/221/policy-for-questions-that-clearly-ask-for-specific-legal-advice">questions which ask for legal advice are off topic and should be closed</a>.</p>
<p>However, sometimes such questions get asked anyway, and sometimes, before the question is closed, people post answers that appear to actually offer legal advice.</p>
<p>Also, sometime people post answers containing legal advice, even when the question didn't ask for it.</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>What, if anything, should be done about answers that appear to offer legal advice?</strong> </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Downvote? Flag? </p>
<p>Is it sufficient just to vote to close the question? What about when the question didn't ask for legal advice, but the answer is offering it anyway?</p>
<p>Leave a comment warning the asker that they ought not to rely on such advice?</p>
<p>Leave a comment warning the answerer that they may be engaging in unlicensed practice of law?</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>How can one identify such answers?</strong> </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Where is the line between general information and legal advice?</p>
<p>I saw <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/7/how-will-we-discourage-people-asking-for-or-giving-legal-advice-in-law?rq=1">How will we discourage people asking for, or giving, legal advice in Law?</a>, but other than the title, it only addresses the question side, not the answer side. Also, "discouraging" is not the same thing as "responding to".</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7643Shouldn't we rewrite questions asking for legal advice?user6726https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/45012019-01-28T17:32:10Z2019-02-01T04:55:10Z
<p>We receive very many questions that are in fact requests for legal advice, contrary to policy, and they are closed only sporadically (primarily in egregious cases). <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/q/36653">Here</a> is a recent example, where a user asked what they should do. This question could be rephrased to become a question about what the law is (it also has a bit of "unclear what you're asking" but I think we can infer that this is a commercial lease and it is in the US since in Canada and Europe nobody turns on the heat at 50 degrees).</p>
<p>One response would be VTC, in the hopes that the user will somehow change the question to not be a recommendation about what legal action she should take, and make it into a question about what principles of law, if any, would favor a tenant in this situation. I doubt that a comment to the effect "you're asking for advice" or closing the question would lead the author to rewrite the question. I also think that leaving legal-advice questions out there for all to see encourages the false belief that LSE is a forum for free legal advice.</p>
<p>In this case, the facts do not strike me as being so specific to the case that it requires a individually-tailored analysis, whereas in some cases (not always easy to identify), there is no possible remedy other than closure. I propose that in cases where a legal-advice request can be clearly converted into a request for information about the state of the law, that (experienced) users should modify the question suitably. This does run contrary to the ethos that users should take responsibility for their questions, but the fact is that we do get a lot of advice questions, and the voting bar for legal advice closings appears to me to be higher than it should be (that is, not enough people VTC questions like this).</p>
<p>I know that a user with sufficient reputation <em>can</em> edit questions in the fashion that I suggest; my question is whether it would be bad practice to engage in a vigorous policy of rewriting question. (There is a corollary question about "unclear" questions, but I thought it would be best to ask a more limited question).</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7610Community Promotion Ads — 2019JNathttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/602019-01-23T12:51:07Z2019-01-23T12:51:07Z
<p>2019 is here! And with the new year, as usual, comes a new iteration of <strong>Community Promotion Ads</strong>! Let’s refresh these for the coming year :)</p>
<h3>What are Community Promotion Ads?</h3>
<p>Community Promotion Ads are community-vetted advertisements that will show up on the main site, in the right sidebar. The purpose of this question is the vetting process. Images of the advertisements are provided, and community voting will enable the advertisements to be shown.</p>
<h3>Why do we have Community Promotion Ads?</h3>
<p>This is a method for the community to control what gets promoted to visitors on the site. For example, you might promote the following things:</p>
<ul>
<li>the site's twitter account</li>
<li>useful law and court references</li>
<li>interesting law-related blogs</li>
<li>cool events or conferences</li>
<li>anything else your community would genuinely be interested in</li>
</ul>
<p>The goal is for future visitors to find out about <em>the stuff your community deems important</em>. This also serves as a way to promote information and resources that are <em>relevant to your own community's interests</em>, both for those already in the community and those yet to join. </p>
<h3>Why do we reset the ads every year?</h3>
<p>Some services will maintain usefulness over the years, while other things will wane to allow for new faces to show up. Resetting the ads every year helps accommodate this, and allows old ads that have served their purpose to be cycled out for fresher ads for newer things. This helps keep the material in the ads relevant to not just the subject matter of the community, but to the current status of the community. We reset the ads once a year, every December.</p>
<p>The community promotion ads have no restrictions against reposting an ad from a previous cycle. If a particular service or ad is very valuable to the community and will continue to be so, it is a good idea to repost it. It may be helpful to give it a new face in the process, so as to prevent the imagery of the ad from getting stale after a year of exposure.</p>
<h3>How does it work?</h3>
<p>The answers you post to this question <em>must</em> conform to the following rules, or they will be ignored. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>All answers should be in the exact form of:</p>
<pre><code>[![Tagline to show on mouseover][1]][2]
[1]: http://image-url
[2]: http://clickthrough-url
</code></pre>
<p>Please <strong>do not add anything else to the body of the post</strong>. If you want to discuss something, do it in the comments.</p></li>
<li><p>The question must always be tagged with the magic <a href="/questions/tagged/community-ads" class="post-tag moderator-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;community-ads&#39;" rel="tag">community-ads</a> tag. In addition to enabling the functionality of the advertisements, this tag also pre-fills the answer form with the above required form.</p></li>
</ol>
<h3>Image requirements</h3>
<ul>
<li>The image that you create must be 300 x 250 pixels, or double that if high DPI.</li>
<li>Must be hosted through our standard image uploader (imgur)</li>
<li>Must be GIF or PNG</li>
<li>No animated GIFs</li>
<li>Absolute limit on file size of 150 KB</li>
<li>If the background of the image is white or partially white, there must be a 1px border (2px if high DPI) surrounding it.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Score Threshold</h3>
<p>There is a <strong>minimum score threshold</strong> an answer must meet (currently <strong>6</strong>) before it will be shown on the main site.</p>
<p>You can check out the ads that have met the threshold with basic click stats <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/ads/display/761">here</a>.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7576Should personal opinions posted as answers be flagged, or just downvoted?Markhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/1372019-01-21T05:56:42Z2019-02-14T02:29:48Z
<p>If someone posts an answer that is essentially "In my opinion,...", should I flag the answer, or just downvote it and move on? And if I do flag it, should it be "not an answer", "very low quality", or a custom flag?</p>
<p>Examples:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/a/36170/137">"I believe it isn't illegal but it would fall under "Anti-social behaviour" which is a civil tort defined by the Anti-social Behaviour Policing and Crime Act 2014."</a> (Note that the claim is wrong: the Act in question says nothing of the sort, and the user is just guessing as to which law applies.)</li>
<li><a href="https://travel.stackexchange.com/a/87710/14002">"I think it would be illegal to carry knife in public everywhere."</a> (Yes, it's on Travel rather than Law, but it's exactly the type of question and answer I'm interested in.)</li>
</ul>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7562The immunity tag is scoped for a specific subset of its topicNijhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/46572019-01-17T06:31:26Z2019-02-13T22:33:18Z
<p>The <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/immunity" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;immunity&#39;" rel="tag">immunity</a> tag info says</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Immunity to civil or criminal liability conferred to an individual by virtue of an office.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>However, this is a group of specific types of immunity, including parliamentary immunity and judicial immunity.</p>
<p>We already have a tag separately for diplomatic immunity, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/diplomatic-immunity" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;diplomatic-immunity&#39;" rel="tag">diplomatic-immunity</a> which is also strictly a subset of the questions that are covered by the above description, and therefore by that tag also.</p>
<p>There are many other types of immunity that have nothing to do with holders of an office, and for which we have questions already on the site that are not tagged appropriately (nobody has created the specific tag, and the general tag cannot be used according to its description, so either it is not tagged or uses some related tag like <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/liability" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;liability&#39;" rel="tag">liability</a>).</p>
<p>The solution requires three things:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Creation of new tag(s) specific to the types of immunity featured in questions which currently are tagged with <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/immunity" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;immunity&#39;" rel="tag">immunity</a>. Judicial immunity for judges and lawyers, parliamentary immunity (potentially with related tag for parliamentary privilege) and similar for elected officials, sovereign immunity for both sovereign states and heads of government not already covered by other immunity.</p></li>
<li><p>Retagging of those questions with the appropriate specific type.</p></li>
<li><p>Editing of the tag info to an appropriate general description, and directions to use one of the more specific tags if this is available.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>A general <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/immunity" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;immunity&#39;" rel="tag">immunity</a> tag info should read</p>
<blockquote>
<p>For questions about immunity from civil or criminal liability conferred on a natural or legal person.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Separately, questions where a further immunity is a topic and are not already tagged as above, need tags created for them.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/75562018: a year in moderationShog9https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/132019-01-01T04:50:40Z2019-01-01T04:50:40Z
<p>It's New Year's Day in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zulu_Time" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stack Exchange land</a>...</p>
<p>A distinguishing characteristic of these sites is how they are moderated:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We designed the Stack Exchange network engine to be mostly self-regulating, in that we amortize the overall moderation cost of the system across thousands of teeny-tiny slices of effort contributed by regular, everyday users.<br>
-- <a href="http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/05/a-theory-of-moderation/">A Theory of Moderation</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>While there certainly are <a href="https://stackoverflow.blog/2018/11/21/our-theory-of-moderation-re-visited/">Moderators</a> here, a significant amount of the <em>moderation</em> is done by ordinary people, using the privileges
they've earned by virtue of their contributions to the site. Each of you contributes a little bit of time and effort, and together you accomplish much.</p>
<p>As we enter a new year, let's pause and reflect, taking a moment to appreciate the work that we do here together.
To that end, here is how the moderation done here on Law breaks down by activity over the past 12 months:</p>
<pre><code> Action Moderators Community¹
---------------------------------------- ---------- ----------
Users suspended² 2 14
Users destroyed 2 0
Users contacted 3 0
Tasks reviewed³: Suggested Edit queue 399 714
Tasks reviewed³: Reopen Vote queue 74 101
Tasks reviewed³: Low Quality Posts queue 317 264
Tasks reviewed³: Late Answer queue 130 186
Tasks reviewed³: First Post queue 74 2,630
Tasks reviewed³: Close Votes queue 735 2,219
Tags merged 3 0
Tag synonyms proposed 3 1
Tag synonyms created 3 0
Questions unprotected 1 0
Questions reopened 40 1
Questions protected 26 35
Questions migrated 68 0
Questions flagged⁴ 1 246
Questions closed 521 261
Question flags handled⁴ 154 93
Posts unlocked 0 21
Posts undeleted 2 29
Posts locked 1 115
Posts deleted⁵ 285 1,278
Posts bumped 0 1,193
Escalations to the CM team 5 0
Comments undeleted 19 0
Comments flagged 3 532
Comments deleted⁶ 1,379 1,061
Comment flags handled 360 175
Answers flagged 52 973
Answer flags handled 886 139
All comments on a post moved to chat 46 0
</code></pre>
<h3>Footnotes</h3>
<p>¹ "Community" here refers both to <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/users">the membership of Law</a> <em>without</em> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/users?tab=moderators">diamonds next to their names</a>, and to the automated systems otherwise known as <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/users/-1">user #-1</a>.</p>
<p>² The system will suspend users under three circumstances: when a user is recreated after being previously suspended, when a user is recreated after being destroyed for spam or abuse, and when a network-wide suspension is in effect on an account.</p>
<p>³ This counts every review that was submitted (not skipped) - so the 3 suggested edits reviews needed to approve an edit would count as 3, the goal being to indicate the frequency of moderation actions. This also applies to flags, etc.</p>
<p>⁴ Includes close flags (but <em>not</em> close or reopen votes).</p>
<p>⁵ This ignores numerous deletions that happen automatically in response to some other action.</p>
<p>⁶ This includes comments deleted by their own authors (which also account for some number of handled comment flags). </p>
<p>Wishing you all a happy new year...</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7541Deletion of a question about pronouns in Canada?Michael Hardyhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/34232018-12-27T07:29:38Z2018-12-28T20:42:57Z
<p>In recent hours there was a question about the controversial professor Jordan Peterson's views on Canadian laws that he thought would regulate the use of pronouns. More than one answer appeared. Has that question and everything under it been deleted?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7520Are questions seeking attorneys with specialized experience in a narrow area of the law on topic hereBurt_Harrishttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/97762018-12-22T17:17:10Z2018-12-22T20:18:15Z
<p>For example, attorneys who have experience in 42 USC 1983? That seems to be a very specialized topic of civil rights law. According to one reference, it is a statute for redressing constitutional and federal statutory violations by state and local officials, by municipalities, and by private-party state actors</p>
<p>I'm looking for an attorney who can demonstrate knowledge of and success with this statute, or at a minimum one who finds the topic interesting.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/750-1How did this SE user get 100 reputation points?Muzehttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/92172018-12-03T20:49:12Z2018-12-03T21:41:58Z
<p>I looked this user up who commented on my post here on Law.SE and he has no history but does have 101 reputation. How is this possible?</p>
<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/users/426/matthew-read">https://law.stackexchange.com/users/426/matthew-read</a></p>
<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/33966/can-women-also-go-shirtless-in-public-legally">Can women also go shirtless in public legally?</a></p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7482Are legal questions about patents within the scope of this site?rhymes_with_dorangehttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/42362018-11-28T02:30:22Z2018-11-28T15:46:05Z
<p>The scope of this site <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic">is stated to include</a>:</p>
<ul>
<li>Statutes or court decisions</li>
<li>Legal terms and language, doctrines and theory</li>
<li>Legal process and procedure</li>
<li>Historical legal applications</li>
<li>Dealing with legal professionals</li>
</ul>
<p>Questions about patents seem to fit within this scope. In particular, such questions will tend to be about statutes, court decisions, and/or legal process and procedure.</p>
<p>Further, <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/662/could-the-scope-of-law-accommodate-the-full-scope-of-ask-patents">this meta discussion</a> appears to include a general consensus that questions about "US patent law or the patent approval process" are certainly within the scope of this site, and accepts that, at the least, the scope of this site and patents.stackexchange.com overlap significantly.</p>
<p>However, a number of questions about patents on this site have been flagged for closure as off-topic because they belong on patents.stackexchange.com. Would such closures be appropriate, or can users continue to ask questions about patent law on this site?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7451Where is the site chatroom?kevinhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/1142018-11-21T06:37:07Z2018-11-21T10:48:07Z
<p>I can no longer find it <a href="https://chat.stackexchange.com/?tab=site&amp;host=law.stackexchange.com">here</a>.</p>
<p>I think every site has a site chatroom? (And FIRC was called "the courtroom"?)</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7432Can I accept an answer if my question has been marked as duplicate?Alex Doehttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/215692018-11-19T05:28:55Z2018-11-20T16:33:06Z
<p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/78DSx.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/78DSx.png" alt="Answer to &quot;Duplicate question&quot;"></a>Can I accept an answer if my question has been marked as duplicate? </p>
<p>If so, how? I noticed there is no "check mark" next to the answer that I found usefull (more so than the similar question where I was told I should find my answer)</p>
<p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/T6hCz.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/T6hCz.png" alt="Stackexchange user21569"></a></p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7391Author Writing a Legal Thriller. Appropriate to Ask Questions Here?Al the Writerhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/216632018-11-08T19:33:05Z2018-11-08T21:28:05Z
<p>I'm writing a legal thriller.</p>
<p>I realize that since I have limited legal experience (and by "limited" I mean "no"), I am going to make mistakes. I am committed to writing this book, however, and I hope to use this forum as a resource to answer questions I'm unable to resolve elsewhere.</p>
<p>Is that appropriate?</p>
<p>Here's an example of a question I have (jurisdiction: California):</p>
<p><strong>If someone asks to have his attorney present during the execution of a search warrant, are the police likely to delay until the attorney gets there?</strong></p>
<p>Thank you!</p>
<p>Al</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/735-1What is purpose of this site if my relevant question isn't acceptable?Swapnilhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/215862018-11-06T15:19:35Z2018-11-07T19:57:15Z
<p>I had asked it on Interpersonal stack exchange but they suggest me to ask here on Law stack exchange.<br>
My question is about law and I don't think it's off-topic?
Here is my question<br>
<a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/33219/should-i-file-a-case-against-people-who-bothering-and-harassing-my-family">Should I file a case against people who bothering and harassing my family?</a><br>
I wonder need to ask for attention of beta on meta. </p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7342Is this question off-topic?ChrisWhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/47762018-11-06T11:21:03Z2018-11-07T17:55:54Z
<p>Isn't the question <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/q/33212/4776">Students drugs teacher</a> an example of a <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/221/4776">question that clearly asks for specific legal advice</a>?</p>
<p>It seems to me to be asking, "This happened to me, is this actionable and under what statute?" -- isn't that asking for legal advice?</p>
<p>Why is this question popular and not closed? Does the faq about legal advice not really mean what I thought it's saying?</p>
<hr>
<p>Also that faq says </p>
<blockquote>
<p>edit the question to make it a question that asks for general legal information".</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Why does rewording a question as a hypothetical -- e.g. "suppose X happened" instead of "X happened to me" -- make it any significantly better?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7312Are questions of the type "which countries this legislation happens" on topic in Law SE?Pablohttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/72892018-10-23T12:53:22Z2018-10-23T15:53:26Z
<p>I would like to know in which countries certain legislation happens. Some SE might consider questions asking for a list of things to be "too broad" or off-topic, but in this case the set of options is limited to around 200. Are these kind of questions on topic in Law SE?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7281Would a canonical Q&A/Tutorial on the minimum needed in order to comply with DMCA be appropriate on this site?ispirohttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/57252018-10-15T18:40:54Z2018-10-21T14:19:09Z
<p>I realize that it might not follow the usual rules to the letter, but on StackOverflow, some useful questions were let be (at least in the past). Here's one example: <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/388242/the-definitive-c-book-guide-and-list">The Definitive C++ Book Guide and List</a>.</p>
<p>DMCA affects a large audience of non lawyers, and who better to help this audience, than the contributors of this site.</p>
<p>I was thinking along the lines of the "walkthroughs" that Microsoft has on their site for executing some programming tasks. (<a href="https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/ide/walkthrough-create-a-simple-application-with-visual-csharp-or-visual-basic?view=vs-2017" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Example</a>)</p>
<p>Of course the answer would be just for general information ("IANAL" etc.).</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7255Should Law.Se have separate tags for jurisdiction and subject matter?TTEhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/37542018-09-28T17:44:39Z2018-10-23T17:58:56Z
<p>The tag field for Stack Exchange currently does not discriminate between the types of tags. This feature works fine for most Stack Exchange sites as the subject matter is universal. However there are many questions everyday on Law.SE that are unanswerable due to the jurisdiction not being defined. Rather than require members to try and solicit a jurisdiction from the OP or to edit based on the question would it be better to have a tag field for jurisdiction and one for subject matter instead of one?</p>
<p>The jurisdiction would not have to be a specific jurisdiction. It could be something <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/common-law" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;common-law&#39;" rel="tag">common-law</a>, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/legal-principles" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;legal-principles&#39;" rel="tag">legal-principles</a>, or <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/schools-of-law" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;schools-of-law&#39;" rel="tag">schools-of-law</a> general, but would reduce the number of questions like:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Is it legal for my landlord to evict me for wearing a blue shirt?</p>
<p>Tags: <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/eviction" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;eviction&#39;" rel="tag">eviction</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/leases" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;leases&#39;" rel="tag">leases</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/no-country" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;no-country&#39;" rel="tag">no-country</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/no-state" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;no-state&#39;" rel="tag">no-state</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/guess-where" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;guess-where&#39;" rel="tag">guess-where</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>which are not answerable or useful. Instead we could for questions to look more like:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Is it legal for my landlord to evict me for wearing a blue shirt?</p>
<p>Subject Matter: <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/eviction" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;eviction&#39;" rel="tag">eviction</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/leases" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;leases&#39;" rel="tag">leases</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/contracts" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;contracts&#39;" rel="tag">contracts</a><br>
Jurisdictions: <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/united-states" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;united-states&#39;" rel="tag">united-states</a> <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/oklahoma" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;oklahoma&#39;" rel="tag">oklahoma</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>There would obviously be technical challenges to program this and retag 10,000 questions, but would the site be better off in the long run if two tag fields were the case?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7231Context: Location of Applicable Lawgatorbackhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/107932018-09-14T14:52:29Z2018-09-15T16:04:28Z
<p>Law varies from country to country and can vary from state to state (e.g. CA vs NY). Is the generally accepted practice that if the OP does not provide the context for the community to provide the necessary inputs to investigate the question, to assume the location of the OP for the location of applicable law?</p>
<p>This might be nice, in the sense that it save the OP the trouble of always stating the location: that being said, I try to remember to state the relevant location to accelerate the answer and make it easy for responders.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7191Is asking "what are my legal options in this case" on topic?Federicohttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/57792018-08-31T10:58:00Z2018-08-31T21:51:32Z
<p>I have a situation where I might contemplate to proceed via legal ways.</p>
<p>Would the question "I have this situation, what are my options/how should I proceed to use them" on topic here?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7180Can I ask for help with a specific PACER query?Jason Chttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/73302018-08-31T01:16:05Z2018-09-04T21:37:49Z
<p>Actually I guess it’s not just PACER, it’s an entire research process.</p>
<p>I am trying to find cases with a specific attorney. I’ve done as much legwork as possible, starting with looking up their bar and court info, through signing up for pacer and cross referencing their site with pacer results, and I’m not seeing the results I expect.</p>
<p>My intent isn’t to get somebody to do the research, it’s to figure out what I’m missing because this is all unfamiliar territory and I don’t understand why I can’t find what I’m looking for, if it’s related to specific court filing practices, missed steps on my part, etc.</p>
<p>Can I ask about it here? It would involve giving the name and site of a specific attorney, and although this attorney has occasionally appeared in mainstream media, it feels like unintentional spam. My question can’t be formed without specific info, though.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7161Question about legislative intent should be reinstated back to Law SEIñaki Viggershttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/185052018-08-27T19:23:52Z2018-08-27T21:46:44Z
<p>It is odd that a <a href="https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/118305/why-does-the-us-flsa-have-a-separate-classification-for-computer-employees">question about legislative intent</a> has been removed from Law SE and placed in Workplace SE. Initially one user suggested that it be moved to politics.stackexchange.com (see comments in that question), which also would be wrong.</p>
<p>Even if legislative intent might stem from political motivations (which is the case for most of the laws), the question is about an enacted law, and the answer was ascertained from its statutory language as well as from judicial construction thereof. Clearly the OP's question reflects an "<em>[...] interest in law</em>", apropos of the description of Law SE in the migration legend.</p>
<p>The post should be restored to <a href="http://law.stackexchange.com">law.stackexchange.com</a>.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7142Are questions about what laws should be instituted on topic?larry909https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/130602018-08-21T14:22:03Z2018-08-22T00:59:31Z
<p>I'd like to ask if people think a law should be instituted in certain circumstances. Is that an acceptable question on the Law site?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/7120Questions about emerging fieldsLio Elbammalfhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/158112018-08-20T09:47:35Z2018-08-20T16:14:12Z
<p>I <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/31016/if-holding-a-photograph-is-permitted-can-a-company-use-facial-recognition">asked a question</a> a few days ago about facial recognition which has, so far, received no answers. I suspect the reason for this is that this technology is fairly new and rare (at least in terms of implementation in businesses) and either no specific laws are in place about it or there is no real precedent for an answer.</p>
<p>In cases like this is there a process for reawakening the questions when answers become evident or do we leave them to be asked again later on?</p>
<p>I thought perhaps there may be a tag for questions which can't be answered yet so they're more easily spotted.</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/6800Should resource lists be community wikis on main site?feetwethttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/102018-04-06T01:55:24Z2018-07-07T06:21:38Z
<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/27394/are-there-freelanse-sites-for-law-advice">Are there freelanse sites for law advice?</a> is about to be closed. It certainly merits closure as a list question. But it might still be a useful community resource. My understanding is that it <em>might</em> be appropriate as a <a href="https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/11741/241697">community wiki</a>. But I'm not sure, and I don't want to act unilaterally to make that conversion.</p>
<p>Does anybody have strong or compelling arguments on this case in particular, or on general guidelines for this Stack Exchange?</p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/66210Could the scope of Law accommodate the full scope of Ask Patents?Macahttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/103432018-03-02T00:16:12Z2018-10-01T14:25:32Z
<p>Ask Patents has a committed, but relatively small community. This has some downstream effects, like the lack of any community moderators, and the lack of diversity in answerers. There has been some discussion over the years of what could be done to remedy this.
For example <a href="https://area51.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/26073/can-ask-patents-be-referred-back-to-area-51">Can ask patents be referred back to Area 51?</a>, <a href="https://patents.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/328/what-to-do-to-get-this-site-more-attention">What to do to get this site more attention?</a> and <a href="https://patents.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/365/would-migrating-copyright-and-trademarks-from-the-general-legal-stack-make-sense">Would migrating Copyright and Trademarks from the general Legal stack make sense?</a>.</p>
<p>This question is prompted by our moderator's comment on the last of these.</p>
<p>At least part of issue with Ask Patents likely stems from its scope being rather narrow. This leads to relatively few good questions, and so relatively few contributors become regulars. One of the options that crops up from time-to-time (at least because I mention it) is whether Ask Patents could be merged into Law, given that there is a great deal of overlap between the scopes of each site. Indeed, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/25594/usc-mpep-guidance-docs-cases">one recent question</a> appeared on both stacks, and got reasonably similar answers.</p>
<p><strong>A comparison between the scopes</strong></p>
<p>For reference, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic">the scope of Law</a> is:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Statutes or court decisions</p>
<p>Legal terms and language, doctrines and theory</p>
<p>Legal process and procedure</p>
<p>Historical legal applications</p>
<p>Dealing with legal professionals</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The <a href="https://patents.stackexchange.com/help/on-topic">scope of Patents</a> is:</p>
<blockquote>
<ol>
<li><p>Prior art for a US patent application, whether anyone knows of any that might exist, or whether something you’ve found would qualify.</p></li>
<li><p>US patent law or the patent approval process</p></li>
<li><p>Specific aspects or interpretations of a particular patent claim</p></li>
</ol>
</blockquote>
<p>The latter two seem clearly within the current scope of Law. That is, US patent law or the patent approval process is clearly within "legal process and procedure". And "specific aspects or interpretations of a particular patent claim" is clearly within "legal terms and language" or "legal process and procedure". Indeed, it is reasonably common to see questions about the interpretation of contract terms. Since a contract is to contract law as a patent is to patent law, it seems reasonable that interpretations of patent claims should be on topic too.</p>
<p>It therefore seems to me that the only potential difference is a question relating to prior art for a US patent application. This is a tricky one. It doesn't neatly fit into any of the categories. In addition, it could be seen as a little close to "specific legal advice", which is explicitly off-topic. But on the other hand, with a little creative interpretation, it is a question relating to "historical legal application" in the sense of "did the USPTO properly apply the requirement for novelty and non-obviousness in this historical patent case?". Since I'm not a regular here, I unfortunately don't have a feel for how the community would react to such a question.</p>
<p><strong>The question</strong></p>
<p>In view of this, my question is in two parts:</p>
<ol>
<li>Does the scope of Law already fully cover the scope of Ask Patents?</li>
<li>If not, would the Law community be in favour of broadening the scope to do so?</li>
</ol>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/6582Why have we 2 tags: England vs England and Wales?Greek - Area 51 Proposalhttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/892018-01-29T06:00:33Z2018-09-05T05:43:57Z
<p>Correct me if <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_law#Application_of_English_law_to_Wales" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Wikipedia's wrong</a>, but England and Wales are the same jurisdiction?</p>
<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/england">https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/england</a></p>
<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/england-and-wales">https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/england-and-wales</a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.fladgate.com/lawyer/tom-bolam/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Tom Bolam</a>, Senior Associate (as of 1-29-2018), Fladgate (Solicitors' firm):</p>
<blockquote>
<p><a href="https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=8f9476e8-b712-4726-b675-21463a3355e9" rel="nofollow noreferrer">United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (to give it its full name) has three separate and distinct legal systems: (i) Scotland; (ii) England and Wales; and (iii) Northern Ireland.</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Neil Guthrie <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/guthrieneil/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">DPhil English (Oxon), LLB (Toronto)</a>. <a href="https://www.amazon.ca/Guthries-Guide-Better-Legal-Writing/dp/1552214729" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Guthrie’s Guide to Better Legal Writing</em> (2017)</a>. p. 95.</p>
<p><a href="https://i.stack.imgur.com/z7T5K.png" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.stack.imgur.com/z7T5K.png" alt="enter image description here"></a></p>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/6377Are questions about religious law on-topic?Robert Columbiahttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/104582017-10-31T01:37:58Z2018-11-19T17:53:46Z
<p>Are questions about the legal systems of organized religions on-topic? Some organized religions have their own legal systems that have their own statutes, procedures, and laws of evidence (e.g. Roman Catholic Canon Law, the Ecclesiastical Court system of the Church of England, <a href="https://www.lds.org/manual/doctrine-and-covenants-instructors-guide-religion-324-325/the-principles-and-purposes-of-church-courts-lesson-41-section-102?lang=eng" rel="nofollow noreferrer">various courts that exist in the LDS religion</a>, Jewish <em>Beit Din</em> courts, etc.). Laws often cover practical questions of the validity of conversions, rules for selecting clergy, offenses that result in excommunication, requirements for marriage, etc. that actually come up once in a while as practical cases.</p>
<p>The practical relevance of religious law in the day-to-day lives of followers varies dramatically - in some faiths, such as the LDS church, religious courts are common occurrences and many (if not most) followers encounter one or at least know someone who has encountered one, while in others, religious courts mostly exist in theory and are used only for the most egregious issues (my own religion has procedures for establishing a court, selecting judges, admitting evidence, issuing sanctions (mostly limited to defrocking clergy and excommunicating public heretics), etc., but, as far as I can tell, my local congregation has never seen an <em>actual case filed</em> in over 30 years, as most people prefer resolving issues using less formal methods instead, e.g. applying social pressure to get someone to leave rather than file formal heresy charges).</p>
<p>To some extent, I would imagine that questions on religious systems of law might be better asked on sites devoted to those religions (and, for example, questions on Jewish legal proceedings <em>are</em> on topic at <a href="https://judaism.stackexchange.com/">Judaism.SE</a>), but then that is not actually a legitimate reason on SE to rule something off-topic here.</p>
<p><em>Obvious pros:</em></p>
<ul>
<li>Many religious legal systems have statutes, rules of procedure, precedent, etc. that can be analyzed in a similar manner to secular law.</li>
<li>Secular law and religious law have developed together over thousands of years and have influenced each other over time.</li>
<li>In many ancient societies, the difference between religious law and secular law was tenuous at best, or nonexistent at worst, as religion and the state were essentially one.</li>
</ul>
<p><em>Obvious cons:</em></p>
<ul>
<li>Many modern religious law systems are heavily integrated into the religions themselves and have little relevance outside of followers of that religion.</li>
<li>Questions about religious law could devolve into religious debates (e.g. your question is irrelevant because your religion is false, convert to mine please).</li>
<li>Some religions are decentralized and do not have final authorities (e.g. legislatures, supreme courts, etc.) to establish binding precedent (some do, however).</li>
<li>In religions that rely on heavily codified rules and procedures, almost any question about the religion can be rephrased as a <em>legal</em> question. For example, the question "Is fooing the bar permitted in Orthodox Judaism?" can be rephrased as "Is it a violation of Torah Law to foo the bar?".</li>
<li>This could lead to a lot of "Is X a sin in Y religion?" questions flooding the site.</li>
</ul>
<p><em>Possible religious law questions that could be asked:</em></p>
<ul>
<li>Is hearsay admissible in a Mormon High Council Court?</li>
<li>What are the qualifications required to be appointed as a Roman Catholic Canon Law judge?</li>
<li>May a member of the Greek Orthodox Church serve as an attorney in a case before a Church of England ecclesiastical judge?</li>
<li>Is belief in the Theory of Evolution sufficient cause to defrock an elder of Jehovah's Witnesses for heresy?</li>
<li>I found this Jewish <em>Beit Din</em> case from 1850. Is it valid precedent today among Lubavitcher Hasids?</li>
<li>Does the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod recognize same-sex marriage?</li>
<li>When filing a motion before the Apostolic Penitentiary in Rome, must the motion be written in Latin?</li>
<li>What defenses were available against a charge of Schism in a Roman Catholic Canon Law court in AD 1200?</li>
<li>An Anglican and a Mormon were married in a civil ceremony. They both want to convert to the Jehovah's Witnesses faith. Is their marriage recognized as valid or must they be re-married in a JW ceremony?</li>
</ul>
<p><em>Obvious possible options:</em></p>
<ul>
<li>Any and all questions about religious law are on-topic.</li>
<li>All religious law questions are off-topic.</li>
<li>Religious law questions are off-topic except to the extent that religious law is, or has been, incorporated into national law systems (for example, <em>Shariah</em> courts in Malaysia).</li>
<li>Religious law questions are on-topic only in cases where there is or was a strong overlap between religious or secular law, or where the law of a particular religion holds, or held, particular influence over society. For example, Catholic Canon Law in 12th century England, or Orthodox Jewish courts in Israel today. Cases in which a religion has negligible influence on how society operates are off-topic (for example, the internal policies of a small Wiccan coven operating out of a basement in Boise, Idaho).</li>
<li>The on-topicness of questions is determined by how <em>interesting</em> or <em>useful</em> they are with respect to the study of law and/or history. For example, a question involving the requirements for publishing verdicts for 14th century Catholic courts in France would probably be on-topic, while large numbers of "I found this random church in the phone book, do they allow persons with tattoos to serve as ushers?" type questions would be essentially useless and therefore off-topic.</li>
<li>Questions about religious <em>procedural law</em> are on-topic (e.g. rules of evidence, process for filing cases, qualifications of judges, etc.), but substantive laws (e.g. "Can you get excommunicated from X church for doing Y?") are not.</li>
</ul>
https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/31310Is this SE suitable to discuss [country]'s law, even if it is non-english speaking?Jorge Leitãohttps://law.meta.stackexchange.com/users/30952015-10-19T10:27:47Z2018-07-19T03:11:45Z
<p>For years we wanted to start a stackexchange for [country]'s law exactly like this, but with [insert number below 100m] people we naturally don't have a chance to create one on its own. Like [country], several other countries also don't have the mass to start its own stack exchange for their law. Until we found this Beta.</p>
<p>I searched on the help center and I didn't saw any problem in adding Q&amp;As about the law of [country]. However, there are a couple of points that I would like to bring before trying to create a community of people from [country] in this SE:</p>
<p>A) Contrary to other stack exchanges, there is no common element besides being "Law". I.e. Programming is global, English is global, Physics is global, Math is global, but law (except international law) is always in respect to a specific country or region. Thus, every question should contain a country-tag (e.g. <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/usa" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;usa&#39;" rel="tag">usa</a>, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/canada" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;canada&#39;" rel="tag">canada</a>, <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/uk" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;uk&#39;" rel="tag">uk</a>) that identifies the country (when the tag is missing, it means USA). Do we agree on this?</p>
<p>B) I didn't found any specific rule regarding the language in the help center, and I confirmed that this <a href="https://law.meta.stackexchange.com/q/1/3095">is an ongoing discussion</a> on Meta. Do we agree that we should write in English, that any relevant citation of the law can be kept in the country's language, but it should be summarised in english?</p>
<p>The thing is that SE is the best tool to community-based Q&amp;A, and this SE seems like the right place for all those questions about [country]'s law. On the other hand, we don't want to disrupt the existing rules of this SE.</p>